Songs About Birds

Tweet tweet, birds sing their tiny hearts out in an attempt to woo their mates, none too dissimilar to our pop heroes. So here's 15 songs dedicated to birds, even if most of them are anthropomorphised. So to redress the balance I've also posted pretty pictures of each bird.

1) T-Rex "Ride A White Swan"
Marc Bolan/ T-Rex were around a smidgeon before I became conscious of the existence of pop & rock music, so I kind of missed the whole thing with him. My exposure to Glam Rock was more Mud, Wizzard and (whisper it) Gary Glitter. Ah such days of innocence... One of my favourite bands were called Swans. Definitely black swans though given the heaviness of their music. They're not in this chart though, because they never penned a ditty to our feathered friends.

2) Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers - "Roadrunner"
This was originally released in 1972 when I was 8 and still sub-music, but I remember seeing it on Top of The Pops at the same time as the fledgeling punk songs so it must have been re-released around 1978. Yeah I know this song's about a car, but there really is such a bird so it counts. Look, here's a picture to prove it.

3) Rolling Stones - "Little Red Rooster"
The Rolling Stones display their Southern US Delta Blues influence by covering this Howlin' Wolf song. Don't think British roosters get overwhelmed by any heat. But I could be wrong.

4) Mahalia Jackson - "His Eye Is On The Sparrow"

I only knew this from the Marvin Gaye version, but that doesn't seem to be on YouTube. But I found this version instead which is really rather wonderful.

5) John Mayer - "Vultures"

Not my sort of music, but my sort of bird. I've written about vultures in several of my stories. I think along with swans, definitely my favourite birds. An odd coupling but then that's me all over, contrary. I'm so contrary I put a song like this in my chart, even though I detest it with a passion. 

6) Nick Cave - "Black Crow King"

When Cave has his black hair cascading down to cover his face, there is something of the corvine about him. An Aussie far from home also influenced by the myth and folklore of the Delta Southern US States. 

7) Nightingales - "Urban Ospreys"

That's a band called The Nightingales singing about Urban Ospreys, not vice versa. One of those bands which garnered much critical acclaim but not much commercial success. I dunno, I did use to own all their albums, but the music just sounded too brittle and light for my tastes so I got rid of them. Still a bit undecided on them to be honest.

8) Public Image Ltd - "Albatross"

The opening track from one of the most daring and radical albums that epitomised 'New Wave' that itself emerged from the 3-chord thrash of punk rock. The album fuses punk and dub-reggae into a very angular and disorienting sound. In my all-time top 10 albums.

9) Iron Maiden - "Where Eagles Dare"

When Iron maiden first burst on to the scene, they seemed to offer a new direction for Heavy Metal, one that addressed social issues in those gloomy years of economic hardship in the 1980s. But a bit of stadium success and it was a reversion to drummers in leather shorts and light shows that could have powered a medium sized third world country. Oh well, opportunity missed.

10)  The Mob - "No Doves Fly Here"

Giving the lie to the notion that anarcho-punk couldn't be 1) elegiac 2) intelligent 3) tuneful

11) The Three Johns - "Teenage Nightingales To Wax"

Three people dancing in the audience and a giant flag. Another one of those indie bands I dutifully used to like and follow around their gigs. Can't think what i saw in them now. 

12) Big Black - "Pigeon Kill"
And then there were bands like this which I wish I had seen live, but never quite managed it. And yes that is Steve Albini's own blood over his white teeshirt. Barnstorming (barnowl storming?)

13) Killing Joke - "The Raven King"
A song written as a eulogy for a dead band member.

14) Elbow - "Starlings"
Youa lways know when a band has gone over the top, when they get a massive orchestra to back them. Portishead excepted, they're allowed to since they're maling soundtracks for movies that don't actually exist.

15) Radiohead - "Morning Mr Magpie"
The first and in all probability last time Radiohead will appear in the pages of this blog...

Strings Attached - Rock'n'Roll With Strings

10 great pop and rock tunes, guitars and string sections in perfect harmony (sort of).

Enjoy!

1) The Ramones - "Baby I Love You"
Kings the warp speed guitar punk slow it right down and get in a string orchestra to beef up the hollowness that would pertain otherwise.



2) Portishead - "Glory Box"
this one actually makes sense since Portishead's music was always suggestive of soundtracks for as yet unwritten movies and this works perfectly.



3) Rolling Stones - "As Tears Goes By"
The Stones had a few songs with lush classical accompaniment. I think it was more acceptable in the 60s when rock and roll was still trying to throw off the shackles of the establishment such as the BBC, when every entertainment programme seemed to employ a backing orchestra. Well it's all just music right?



4) Einsturzende Neubauten" - "Armenia"
I'm not sure if this counts because I don't think they ever played with an orchestra but simply took the tape of an Armenian folk song and um did their deconstructionist musical thing over the top of it. But this is my blog, my chart, my rules and they're one of my all time favourite bands!



5) Goldfrapp - "Clowns"
There's no doubt that a string section add textured lushness to what would otherwise be a very brittle song indeed.



6) Led Zeppelin - "Kashmir"
Bloated bombastic rock epic saved by classical strings. Actually that's not quite fair since the Arab tonal textures make it interesting enough.



7) Aerosmith - "I Don't Want To Miss A Thing"
See this is the problem with adding orchestras to hard rock bands, they believe it makes them all serious and respectable. Whatever happened to those who were enjoined to "Walk This Way?". In this song they're invited to sit down and take the weight off...



8) Massive Attack - "Unfinished Sympathy"
While heavy metal and punk bands glom on some strings either to lend credibility that they are making 'classic' music, or in an ironic fashion, Trip-Hop bands like Massive & Portishead who were mixing and weaving together different types of sounds in their tonal landscapes which meant that the strings sounded more organic and embedded into the ensemble. As in here. Boring video though.



9) The Verve - "The Drugs Don't Work"
The Verve's two biggest hits, this and "Bittersweet Symphony" both employed string sections. I can't even name any of their other songs, don't know if that says anything?



10) REM - "Everybody Hurts"
Lush, lush, lush and now not a description of Peter Buck allegedly in a plane...



Bonus Track - Lou Reed "Perfect Day
Perfect symbiosis, nothing more needs to be said. RIP Lou

States Of Mind - Songs about mental states

The music that was birthed by "The Blues", personal laments of woe, depression and the like, mental states have always been present in rock music. So here's 15 songs around the theme of mental states.


No prizes for guessing the first one-
1) Black Sabbath - "Paranoid"

I was never a fan of Heavy Metal, but this song broke through my natural resistance and affords the grudging acknowledgement that it is undoubtedly a classic. Doesn't excuse hair and clothes though as demonstrated on this video. I own a pair of Ozzy Osbourne style slippers by the way. Oh what has become of Heavy metal? it's become merchandised into asininity like every other music style.



2) Jimi Hendrix - "Manic Depression"
Not great quality I'm afraid, but in a way it only lends to the unsettling nature of its subject matter. Of course mental health experts would insist on the track being renamed Bi-Polar disorder. My father suffered it under its old guise. Not easy to live with, not knowing if he would be bouncing off the ceiling one day, and refusing to get out of bed to go to work the next.



3) Clipse - "Ego"
The heart of it all if you're a Freudian. In an industry dominated by the exaggerated projection of the ego, perhaps Rap projects it the furthest. In this particular case, Clipse's album tracks are littered with song titles drawn from therapy such as "Counselling" and "Life Change" as they struggle with the trappings of their success.



4) Talking Heads - "Psychokiller"
David Byrne is a curious egg, (though not as odd as David "Behemoth" Thomas from Pere Ubu, must have been something in the New York water in the late 1970s) but I've just bought his learned tome "How Music Works" which I'm looking forward to reading.



5) Rolling Stones - "19th Nervous Breakdown"
Not one of my fave tracks of theirs, I prefer "Paint It Black" to be honest and it's such a strong song it even survived a murdering by the band The Mo-dettes.



6) Pink Floyd - "Comfortably Numb"
The shadow of founding member Syd Barret who succumbed to mental illness possibly brought about by drug use, sits large over Roger Waters' composition with other titles such as "Brain Damage" and "Shine On You Crazy Diamond".



7) King Crimson - "21st Century Schizoid Man"



8) The Kinks - "Acute Schizophrenia Paranoia Blues"
Ray Davies was known to have the odd quirk or two wan't he?



9) Cypress Hill - "Insane In The Brain"
Or kids, don't do drugs...
I recently tracked down a book called "Whispers -  The Voices Of Paranoia" for some research, but was very disappointed that although the case studies were interesting stories, most were prompted by drug abuse which wasn't quite what I was after. The author did that to me deliberately...



10) Coil - "Panic"
Coil were a band who actively pursued the lesser known regions & emotions of the human mind in their music. Partly through drugs and also through the occult, myth and ritual. Big Alastair Crowley fans. Still, I don't hold that against them.



11) Sonic Youth - "Schizophrenia"
Their best ever song was called "Expressway To Yr Skull" which I saw them play live and was blown away by and couldn't wait to own on the forthcoming album. And when the record came out, they'd renamed the track "Madonna, Sean & Me" which doesn't quite carry the same impact somehow...



12) Suicidal Tendencies - "Institutionalized"
I first came across this song on the movie "Repo Man" and what a great song it is. But then the band went all stupid skate rock and that was that.



13) Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers - "She's Cracked"
Trouble with Jonathan Richman is that you can't really take any of his songs too seriously with his droll delivery. Still can't disguise how great some of his songs were though.



14) Breeders - "Happiness Is a Warm Gun"
Yeah I know it's a Beatles song but I infinitely prefer this version. So shoot me. Mind you even the Beatles' original is better than U2's version.



15) Nirvana - "Lithium"
The fact that Kurt Cobain put a shotgun to his head probably suggests her knew what he was singing about in songs like this one. My father was prescribed lithium; imagine putting a metal into your bloodstream, well that's what lithium treatment is.

Cover Versions

I've never seen the point of cover versions that just replicate the original. Then there are those cover versions that simply murder the original, check out Grace Jones and Swans' cover versions of Joy Division songs "She's Lost Control" and "Love Will Tear Us Apart" respectively.  Both make me want to rip my own ears off.

But occasionally the cover version is neither homage nor pastiche, but actually manages to improve on the original. Maybe it just has better quality of the recording. But more likely it's either more deliciously taut than the original, or perhaps more camp and reveals what was present in the original composition all along but had just got hidden.

So here's 15 of my favourite cover versions. Enjoy.


1) The Specials - Message to Rudy
The Specials did several cover versions of Ska songs, launching off with a cover of "Gangsters". But this just throbs with emotion that lifts it from the original by Dandy Livingstone whose vocals are a bit tentative.



2) The Stranglers - Walk On By
While Dionne Warwick's original is pretty damn fine, the sheer dirtiness of the bass sound and Hugh Cornwall's guttural vocals just make this a totally different song. Someone should do a mash up of the two it would be ace.



3) Flying Lizards - Money
Deborah Evans does her best Nico impression and this knocks the Beatles' original into a cocked hat. It's so basic, so stripped down, it's almost perfect pop, or anti-pop.



4) Devo - Can't Get No Satisfaction
Robot-aping geeks pleasingly lance the self-contentment of Jagger's priapic original.



5) Saint Etienne - Only Love Can Break Your Heart
Yes they were Camden Town music hipsters playing fast and loose with musical post-modern irony, but since I've always found Neil Young's voice a bit reedy, having a deliciously fragile female vocalist sing it made much more sense. Know it all pop that turns out to be just perfect pop in its own right.



6) The Klaxons - The Bouncer
Another of those rarities where I like both versions equally, but the tribal nature of the two clans, the old school dance mob who love the original versus the Nu-Rave devotees of this version go at it hammer and tong in the comments section.



7) Gun Club - My Man's Gone Now
This is the inverse of the Warwick/Stranglers scenario. For here is Nina Simone's full-bloodied original dripping with regret, hurt and a touch of bile, turned into a camp late night whisky bar song (and sung off key to boot) by one of the hardest living & rocking bands in the world. I can't get enough of it.



8) Butthole Surfers - Hurdy Gurdy Man
And then there are some that are just weird and wonderful. Donovan's original was a bit odd in its own distortion pedalled right and the Buttholes just turned that up to eleven in their hilarious version.



10) Soft Cell - Tainted Love
Marc Almond takes Gloria Jones' Motowny feel and manages to make it both seedy and full of pathos at the same time. One of the songs that perhaps shows the biggest differential between the two versions.



11) Minutemen - Have You Ever Seen The Rain
Another example of a beefier modern sound improving a slightly hollow 60's version as Creedance Clearwater Revival's genius is suggested by having so many modern bands pay tribute to them with cover versions.



12) The Clash - Armagideon Time
Even live the quality and musical noodles going on here put Willie Williams' version into the shade I'm afraid. And this was only ever a Clash B-Side!



13) Rachid Taha - Rock el Casbah
Boot on the other foot now and The Clash have one of their songs claimed in another style. This sounds somewhat more authentic somehow.



14) Tricky - Black Steel
Tricky takes a plodding Public Enemy standard and turns it into an genuinely unnerving version.



15) World Domination Enterprises - Funkytown
I can think of few songs that have so utterly had the band's stamp smeared and coated all over it like this. West London blight stamped all over a disco number by Lipps Inc. that was more likely to have been played in the clubs of the West End.



Bonus Track:
William Shatner - Mr Tambourine Man
I say bonus track.... There is always the spectre of non-singing celebs doing terrible cover versions, like Paul Gascgoine singing Fog On The Tyne. Shatner here does to pop music what he did to method acting.

Music Colour Therapy - Songs about colours

Color Me Badd, as if there aren't a host of bands with a colour in their name, Black Sabbath, White Stripes, Green Day, Blue Oyster Cult, Simply Red, Maroon 5, Red Lorry Yellow Lorry...

But here are songs involving colours rather than just the band names. Good and bad!

Enjoy

1) "Paint It Black" - Rolling Stones
Beatles or Stones? I was never really either, but I preferred the Stones' edge over the Beatles, though didn't really dig many of their songs. This however is a classic and has a real menace.



Honourable mentions:
"Black Candy" - Beat Happening
"Black Betty" Ram Jam
"Blackheart Man" - Bunny Wailer
"Black Night" - Deep Purple
Black Dog - Led Zepplin

Dishonourable Mentions:
"Men In Black" - The Stranglers makes David Bowie's "Laughing Gnome" sound meaningful


2) "Curious Oranj" - The Fall
Orange, the word that has no rhyme and therefore unlikely to lend itself to lyricism. Unless you're Mark E Smith, who echoed a 60s avant garde film from Yugoslavia and composed a score for a modern ballet (performed by Michael Clark's dance company) based on the colour divide in Northern Ireland. Barmy but fun.



Honourable mentions:
"Orange Crush" - REM

3) "Purple Haze" - Jimi Hendrix
'Scuse me while I kiss this guy'... Simply definitive song by the master. It's about drugs ya know? I see purple landing smoke canisters for helicopters in Vietnam whenever I hear this song. Like I say, definitive...



Honourable mentions:
"Purple Rain" - Prince

4) "All Cats Are Grey" - The Cure
After their debut album of low-fi pop pun, that difficult follow-up album was the doomy gloomy "Seventeen Seconds" from which this track was taken. It was the prelude to Smith's ridiculous White Rabbit meets Goth phase which was cartoonish in its sentiment, but this track represents them when they actually meant their angst.



Honourable mentions:
"Fade To Grey" - Visage
"Grey Day" - Madness

5) "Green Light" - Sonic Youth
From when Sonic Youth were still good and making interesting, discordant music. Although this song musically references another of their own songs "Death Valley 69" which is a bit cheeky methinks. There are many honourable mentions for this colour, the colour must conjure up lots of things. Note, rap artists singing about 'green' as in money were not considered for this category



Honourable mentions:
"Everything's Gone Green" - New Order
"Pretty Green" - The Jam
"Green Green Grass Of Home" - Tom Jones
"Green Onions" - Booker T & The MGs

6) "Golden Brown" - The Stranglers
I remember this with its whimsical harpsichord vibe getting into the charts. And yes it's about drugs. Colours... drugs, seeing a theme develop here.



Honourable Mentions:
"Golden Years" - David Bowie
"Fools Gold" - Stone Roses
"Brown Sugar" - Rolling Stones
"Don't It Make Your Brown Eyes Blue" - Crystal Gale

Dishonourable Mentions:
"Brown Girl In The Ring" - Boney M
"Gold_ - Spandau Ballet - always hated this song, even before it became the theme or motif music of 1001 quiz and sports' shows

7) "Blue Monday" - New Order
The Blues, well this colour clearly would have the most entries, but this is the daddy of them all.



Honourable mentions:
"Mr Blue Sky" - ELO
"Preaching The Blues" - Gun Club
"Gravedigger Blues" - Beat Happening

Dishonourable mentions:
"Mr Blue Sky" - ELO - sometimes it's just too damn cheerful for my mood. Music can be like that you know!


8) "Pink Turns To Blue" - Husker Du
A band of heavy guitar punk/new wave playing really muscular music, all three members of this power trio eventually coming out as gay which gave a whole new insight into their love songs. Fabulous.



Honourable mention:
"Pink Cadillac" - Natalie Cole
"Pretty In Pink" - Psychedelic Furs

9) "Violet" - Hole
I know it's heresy, but I actually preferred Mrs Cobain's band to Kurt's mob. If you'll excuse the implicit sexism, she had more balls in her music and lyrics than hubby.




10. "White Lines" - Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five
Has this been bettered as early hip-hop? I don't think so. White, symbol of purity (and purity of powdered drugs) seems to be a very popular colour of choice in song titles. White noise? Don't you believe it.



Honourable mentions:
"White Rabbit" - Jefferson Airplane
"White Riot" - The Clash
"White Punks On Dope" - The Tubes
"Whiter Shade Of Pale" - Procul Harum
"Knights in White Satin" - Moody Blues
"Ride A White Swan" - T-Rex

10) "Silver Machine" - Hawkwind
Hawkwind were a band that divided (I mean check out this video for bubbles, flutes and strange mute women in astral make-up as to why) but still the greasers stuck to their preferred choice of music. I happen to be a punk who really likes this song.



Honourable Mention:
"Silver Rocket" - Sonic Youth
"Silver" - Pixies

Dishonourable mention:
"Silver Lining" - Stiff Little Fingers - what punk mutated to when they ran out of rage



Dishonourable mention - The colour red.
Red, colour of passion and flame and yet a strange paucity of songs honouring the colour. All I could think of was "Red, Red Wine", a ska reggae version by Tony Tribe which is pretty neat, but then later covered by UB40 which should have been named "Red, Red Whine".

Songs For The Days Of The Week

Many of us work 5 days a week, have fun over the weekend. And yet Sunday offers less opportunity for going full throttle because you have to be fresh for work Monday. Mondays are always tougher to stomach than other weekdays because of the changeover from your leisure time to work time. Fridays are full of expectancy for the weekend ahead. Wednesdays are blurgh nothingy days in the middle of the week.... So since many people's weeks are so rhythmic, I thought I'd look at the music associated with them.

I've already done 7 songs for Monday and the return to work feeling here. (It's proved to be my most popular musical blog post yet, other than my scorecard for Joy Division cover versions post) So below are 2 songs a day for each of the other 6 days of the week.

SUNDAY:
Velvet Underground - "Sunday Morning"
New York, Andy Warhol, Avant Garde, Cale's viola, Tucker's drumming, Nico's inhuman, sexless delivery, 'the most influential record of the late 20th Century' etc etc. And while the Velvet's self-title debut is a truly great record, this track sees Lou Reed in wistful mode as with the later "Perfect Day", rather than the deeply unsettling "Venus In Furs" or "All Tomorrow's Parties".



U2 - "Sunday Bloody Sunday
U2 getting all political? Were they calling for a Royal Commission of Inquiry into events in Derry in 1972 Don't worry, carry on drinking your mango and peach smoothie and rest easy. Bono's wooly, vague lyrics call for nothing more than all coming together and joining hands to seal the victory claimed by Jesus. You can almost here the sound of his hackles rising here as his back raises up against the wall...



TUESDAY:
Cowboy Junkies - "Sun Comes Up It's Tuesday Morning"
Cowboy Junkies offered the chance for Country Music to become more palatable to a rock audience, with their Canadian sensibilities and a beautiful voice in the form of Margo Timmins. Even I liked them. But the meme didn't quite stick and we ended up with Garth Brooks and Billy Ray Cyrus instead.



Rolling Stones - "Ruby Tuesday"
Either you respect their Bloated Satanic Majesties as they pound on into their 50th year, or you yearn for their Blues tinged early days from which this song emerged. This version makes htem sound like Flowered Up!



WEDNESDAY:
The Undertones - "Wednesday Week"
This is more like it, love marked out by the number of days without the phone call being returned. (Of course long since disappeared now with instant texting and the like). The true rhythms marked out by tiny signs and tokens, received or missed. Whole days at work lost to mooning over some object of improbable desire. Or phoning your mate to forensically dissect the previous evening's eye signals in the pub... This si what Pop Music was invented for!



Simon And Garfunkel - "Wednesday Morning 3 AM"
The sound of their voices is so tentative that it really does sound like 3am and not wanting to wake the face on the pillow next to you, even as you go through the mill wondering just what the hell it is you've done rolling over a liquor store to get money. Cops will be there with their battering ram in a couple of hours...



THURSDAY:
David Bowie - "Thiursday's Child"
I've said it before, for all his longevity, you can count the number of decent tunes Bowie's produced on the fingers of one finger, sorry hand. This isn 't one of them, but Thursday turned out to be the hardest day of the week to find tunes for.



Rollins Band - "Thursday Afternnon"
Our 'enry does even less singing on this track than on most. But he's not shouting either, so this must be one of his more mellow ditties. A peaen to love or something? Search me... Love the cocktail bar chitter-chatter in the mix! You just know two seconds after the tape cuts out, Henry is berating them for not keeping the noise down!



FRIDAY:
Nancy Sinatra - Friday's Child
You gotta love Nancy. The scion of the King of Crooners himself, it was always going to be hard to forge her own path through the 'Middle of the Road' music world, but by taking a slightly sinister and off-kilter slant she managed it alright. This is a perfect example of it I feel.



The Cure - "Friday I'm In Love"
Robert Smith, the boy who never grew up. In fact he actually regressed, from the student who wrote a song based on the novel he studied for French O-Level, to someone who seemed to want to exist in the world of Charlotte Sometimes. Is that a long-sleeved shirt or a straitjacket?



SATURDAY:
The Jam - "Saturday's Kids"
Ah the weekend, freedom, time away from the weekly grind right? Not with these two songs about desultory Saturday youth. The V-Neck shirts and baggy trousers might have changed, but not the sentiment.



The Specials - Friday Night, Saturday Morning
The B-Side to the epoch defining "Ghost Town", Terry Hall's vocal sounds even more desolate than on the flipside track. Brilliant. Wonderful Jerry Dammers keyboard solo in the middle too!

10 Devilish Songs

They say the Devil has all the best tunes. Judge for yourself with these ten diabolic ditties. So many top tunes in fact that Cliff Richard's "Devil Woman" doesn't quite sneak in...

1) Robert Johnson - "Me And The Devil Blues"
From the original Grandaddy of all things devilish and selling your soul for the gift, comes this song from the crossroads where only the unholy got buried...



2) Pink Floyd - "Lucifer Sam"
A bit 60s psychedelic, but dem were the times. Animal familiar of the Devil rather than Old Nick himself, still that's hippies for you...



3) Laibach - "Sympathy For The Devil"
A Rolling Stones cover version, made suitably diabolic by the totalitarian posturing of this group from war-torn Yugoslavia. The Stones' song had a film dedicated to it made by Jean Luc Godard "One Plus One" when people really did think the Devil was about to inherit his realm with all the revolutionary upheaval of the late 1960s.



4) Daniel Johnston - "Don't Play Cards With Satan"
Daniel Johnston's mental disorders (schizophrenia and bi-polar) lend his art a heart-wrenching intensity (think of a musical version of Van Gough maybe). Just listen to his voice in this track and you have to credit that Daniel really, really believes in the Devil. Even the guitar strumming sounds possessed.



5) Funkadelic - "Miss Lucifer's Love"
Funky devils and why not? The devil in this case is almost certainly human and mortal, but when it's George Clinton you're talking about, that can be pretty other-worldly anyway! Groovy little devil.



6) Beck - "Devil's Haircut"
Beck doing what Beck does best and with the usual impermeability of his lyrics. Just a good song really...



7) Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - "Up Jumped The Devil"
Seeped in Southern Gothic as Nick Cave is, Old (horned) Nick was going to make an appearance sooner or later in his music.



8) Big L - "Devil's Son"
Rappers are often portrayed as Folk Devils threatening the moral fibre of society. Here's a song that certainly had its fair share of trouble because of its extreme subject matter and kept getting pulled from release. Big L imagines that he is indeed Satan's offspring and goes on the rampage against Satan's enemies; er that would be Christians...



9) B52s - "Devil In My Car"
Just to lighten the mood a touch, the B52s bubble-gum rock camp it up when they discover that the devil has hitched a lift with them...



10) Butthole Surfers - "Sweatloaf"
The Devil always pops up in heavy metal music, but I'm not a metalhead really. But the Butthole Surfers always wanted to be Black Sabbath and this song is as funny as hell. Literally. Its starts quietly, so give it a chance. It was always great live, when lead vocalist Gibby Haynes ad libbed the intro with his insane mental jottings. Great fun.



11) Max Romeo - "Chase The Devil"
If Heavy Metal pays lugubrious homage to all things satanic, you'd imagine Reggae would play it for real as the enemy of their beliefs. And Max Romeo here does exactly that to fine effect.

A Little Light Molotov Cocktail Music

The firemen are going on strike on bonfire night in response to the threat of redundancy unless they sign their new employment contracts. They could be the first of many with the recent announcement of cuts to public spending here in the UK. Will there be a significant outcry, will the British rise up in a swathe of civil protest and disobedience? At the end of this post is a snippet of my novel "Not In My Name" which considered this question against the backdrop of the Iraq War. But before then, here's ten top tunes for you while you siphon petrol from cars and fill those milk bottles...

1) The Clash - "White Riot"

Now if all those people crushed like sardines bobbing their heads could just take to the streets... What interests me in this clip is the role of the hangers on & wannabe cheerleaders. Ultimately, they are the ones who stifle any militancy by their pathetic leeching. They just want to be stars...

2) Ice Cube - "We Had To Tear This Mother Up"

The whole Ice Cube album "The Predator" from which this is taken, was a devestating response to the Rodney King farrago and the subsequent riots. Righteous indignation and a searing soundtrack to a burning city.

3)Rolling Stones - "Street Fighting Man"

You wouldn't know to look at them now, but the Stones were sort of there on the front line with their drugs' bust forming part of the public discourse on the issue. But this time round we probably won't call on them to lead the charge.

4) Dead Kennedys - "Riot"

The eight or so people who get up on stage and turn it into a mini riot, only evidence the 99.9% who are content to stand in the auditorium and watch them. Cadre moshers... The song also points out that in riots, people mainly end up burning their own communities.

5) Kaiser Chiefs - "I Predict A Riot"

A predictable choice perhaps. People getting lairy just about sums it up. Or pissed and peevish as I prefer to term it.

What? it's called subversion...

6) Sonic Youth - "Teenage Riot"

Hormones frequently get in the way of political action...

7)Crass - "Bloody Revolution"

Ah happy daze...

8) Gang Of Four - "Capital (it fails us now)"

Don't say we weren't warned back in the early 80's

9) Billy Bragg - "Which Side Are You On"

One man and his guitar leads the vanguard to the promised land. Or not.

10) Cornershop - "England's Dreaming"

I quite like this song actually

Okay, I've set myself up for a grand fall by my snarkiness. For what it's worth, here's my fictional analysis of why there won't be any revolutionary uprising in the UK.

"The idea of a radical Left in this country is a joke. A contradiction in terms. Shall I tell you why -?”

“No, but I’ve a feelin’ ya gunny anyway”.

“In Latin countries, in Europe and the Americas, the foot soldiers of the Revolution can discipline and hone themselves out in the wild, sultry outdoors. Stay hidden in jungles, live out of sight in mountain ranges. Back here, we just don’t have the space. Would-be sans culottes such as the likes of you, are left to fulminate in dingy public houses and ferment your flabby beer bellies. Our climate only lends itself to beer and sandwiches militancy. Pickled onions and scotched eggs. Little Napoleons with their miniature armies of flying pickets. Your activities were responsible for the destruction of those industries as much as economic forces”.

“Is that right?”

“Too damn right it is!”

“Even ostriches have to come up from the sand for air. Your Clydeside may well have been Red, but further upstream, the only thing turning pink under the sun, wasn’t any cadres on exercises, but poached salmon. As in stolen. See, what you fail to comprehend, is most people actually quite like the quality of their life in Britain. There are some birthrights, that even the most foaming fanatic would be loathe to relinquish. How would the new order guarantee such a range of beers in our glasses, from Real Ale to imported lagers? Or maintain a languidly thrilling five test match series against former colonies? Or foster such a thriving music industry, so as to soundtrack their own personal embitterment?”

“Fer sad English bastards mebbee, do’nae tar the Scots wi’all that”.

“You never know, global warming might now foster the conditions for developing a year zero tendency in our midsts, even in Bonny Scotland. You've got the mountains there after all”.

“Yer talking pish and you know it!“